NIGHT STALKER DIES IN PRISON

LOS ANGELES 
Richard Ramirez, the demonic serial killer known as the Night Stalker who left satanic signs at murder scenes and mutilated victims’ bodies during a reign of terror in the 1980s, died early Friday in a hospital, a prison official said.

Ramirez, 53, had been taken from San Quentin’s death row to a hospital where authorities said he died of liver failure. Prison officials said they couldn’t release more details on the cause of death, citing federal patient privacy laws.

Ramirez had been housed on death row for decades and was awaiting execution. At his first court appearance, Ramirez raised a hand with a pentagram drawn on it and yelled, “Hail Satan.”

His marathon trial, which ended in 1989, was a horror show in which jurors heard about one dead victim’s eyes being gouged out and another’s head being nearly severed. Ramirez was convicted of 13 murders that terrorized Southern California in 1984 and 1985, as well as charges of rape, sodomy, oral copulation and attempted murder. The killing spree hit its peak in the hot summer of 1985, as the nocturnal killer, called the Night Stalker by the press, entered homes through unlocked windows and doors.